The Study Of Cai Yi's Esthetic Thoughts

In the history of modern esthetics in China, Cai Yi is a very thoughtful and accomplished esthetician. His esthetic ideas were formed in the 1940s, and gradually became mature. His esthetic thoughts are an important part in Marxist esthetics with Chinese characteristics, and also an organic component of the ecology of Chinese modern esthetic development. Its formation and development reflect the process of the exploration of Chinese modern esthetics after twists and turns, and have made an indelible contribution to the history of establishing Chinese esthetics. Based on the special role Cai Yi have played in Chinese modern aesthetics, the present thesis put its emphasis on the study of Cai Yi's aesthetic theories, which aims to explore the under-deep influence and importance of Cai Yi's aesthetics in the undergoing process of Chinese modern aesthetics. The thesis intends to carry on its research with Cai Yi's aesthetics been put in the background of literal and artistic history of China, and its end is to make contributions to the construction of contemporary aesthetics.This thesis consists of five parts. To begin with, the thesis provides an introduction, which presents the reason why Cai Yi's esthetic thoughts were chosen as a research topic. The main considerations lie in its special status and importance in the history of Chinese modern esthetics. Cai Yi's esthetics is a significant theory established in the process of Chinalization of Marxism and the modernization of Chinese aesthetics, which not only of creativity and practical value, but also provides a prevalent model with authority in Chinese contemporary and modern aesthetics. From the historical fate of the authoritative model, we can see the glory and embarrassment that Chinese contemporary aesthetic theory has experienced. On this sense, Cai Yi's aesthetics is an indispensable part of contemporary and modern Chinese aesthetics. This thesis seeks not only to discuss and study the formation and characteristics of Cai Yi's aesthetic thought, but also further extend to research of the understanding of the whole contemporary aesthetic history, and it analyzes the basic developing trends of Chinese contemporary aesthetic theory from case studies.Chapter one is about the theoretical background of Cai Yi's esthetic thoughts. This thesis introduces the spread of various esthetic ideas before the birth of Cai Yi's esthetics. It can be divided into two routes: one mainly introduces a variety of the Western idealistic esthetics; such as the representative Zhu Guangqian; the other introduces the introduction of the Marxist esthetics, Lu Xun is an example. The parallel aesthetic theories are the theoretical background of Cai Yi's esthetics.Chapter two is about Cai Yi's construction of the new esthetic system. The thesis points out that Cai Yi's new idea origins from studying aesthetics perspective of Marxism. Based on this, the materialist theory of reflection and the arts typification constitute the two most important logical links of Cai Yi's aesthetic theory. Cai Yi's construction of the new esthetic system mainly involves the following two aspects. Firstly, according to the method of Marxist materialism, he made enormous changes to the old esthetic thoughts, and established a new aesthetic system with materialist reflectionism as its core idea, and then he made new classification and definition to beauty and aesthetics. Secondly, based on the philosophical reflectionism, Cai Yi believes the typicality of beauty in the objective things, and as well he thinks typification and the nature truth are the same thing. He believes that the knowledge of beauty is separated from the general knowledge, but at the same time he believes that beauty is the truth of their specific forms, which is the limitation of his theory of aesthetics.Chapter three is about the historical status of Cai Yi's aesthetic theory, both from its contributions and shortcomings. On one hand, historical influence and theoretical attribution of Cai Yi's theory of aesthetic is indispensable. First, the fundamental thought of his research of aesthetics is to create a brand new art, which reflects the trends of the contemporary times. On the other hand, his theory has its limitations. Cai Yi has not studied the dialectical unity between human beings and the material world from the view of practice. This results in many limitations in his theories, which is criticized by some estheticians.To sum up, Cai Yi's esthetic theory is an important outcome in the process of the development of Marxism in China and the modernization of Chinese esthetics. It is a significant reference for out present esthetic studies. It tells us: with the attention to the diversity of the value and the openness of the system, Chinese esthetics will have an extension and new development, and will maintain the vitality and creativity.